Beef producer, Duncan Robertson, of Old Bonalbo, with NSW DPI’s Casino-based livestock officer, Bill Hoffman.

North coast beef producer Duncan Robertson has a “keep-it-simple” breeding philosophy that has worked well for him over the past 30 years.

He’s a supporter of cross breeding because it works – the hybrid vigour he says “gives better returns without much effort” on his Upper Clarence country near Old Bonalbo.

But since moving on from a straight-bred Hereford herd in the 1970s Duncan has learnt that “keeping it simple” is important in the cattle breeding game.

“Most of our weaner heifers go to the veal market and the steers are sold on the store weaner market – so weight to maximise dollar returns is the key driver in our breeding program,” he said.

“Many years ago we settled on the F1 Brahman/Hereford cow because we know it’s so adaptable to our lighter country.

“It’s a fantastic easy-care female with attributes of both breeds – it lasts a long time, doesn’t get eye problems, stays strong in poor conditions and tolerates parasites.

“We’ve been experimenting with terminal sires over the years and currently we’re using Charolais bulls over the F1 cows – and we’re happy with the result.

“The three unrelated breeds seem to click together better than others in this region – giving us good carcase attributes and growth rates.

“At the moment our replacement females are coming from a small Hereford herd mated to Brahman bulls that we run within the enterprise. But we’d like to change things to make it a self-replacing program.

“I haven’t decided exactly how to do that yet but I have kept some Charolais-sired heifers which I may mate to Charbray sires.

“Alternatively, the other option is to use a criss-cross program based on Charolais and Brahman bulls.”

NSW DPI’s Casino-based livestock officer Bill Hoffman says Duncan is a good example of how beef cattle breeding can and should be a relatively simple task.

Mr Hoffman says the key is to follow a series of logical steps:

• have a target market and know the specifications (weight, fatness, age, yield, eating quality attributes etc.)
• know which aspects of the specifications have the greatest influence on the financial return. Is it weight, age, marbling?
• is it a self-replacing herd? That is, are replacements kept from within the herd or sourced outside?
• understand the environment – what production levels are possible and whether some breeds perform better than others.

“Once a beef breeder has worked through these steps it should be easier to design and implement a breeding program,” Mr Hoffman said.

Important things to focus on are:

• the aspect of the specifications with the most influence on financial return. Often this will be weight at a given age and fatness, but in some markets things such as marbling are important.
• if it is a self-replacing herd, maternal considerations (such as fertility and milking ability) need to be taken into account. But it needs to be kept in balance, for example, too much emphasis on selection for low muscularity hoping for fertility gains can have a detrimental influence on the herd’s production.
• select a breed or breeds that will maximise the financial return within the environment constraints that occur.
• Use all the tools available to select the right bull to deliver on your objectives.